


All or Nothing

by Shipping_all_the_things



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Powers, Alternate Universe - Roommates/Housemates, Asexual Tony Stark, Multi, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Pansexual Bruce Banner, You heard me, late night science binges, steve is a frank sinatra kind of man, the winter soilder is a puppy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-15
Updated: 2016-02-29
Packaged: 2018-05-20 15:31:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6014185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shipping_all_the_things/pseuds/Shipping_all_the_things
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alright so you found this summary and decided to read it, good job. By the process of elimination that probably also means that you want to read the story of a handsome, selfless, asexual man named Tony Stark and his pansexual friend Bruce ‘ill figure out his middle name someday’ Banner.<br/>"You’re kidding right?" <br/>Fine. The story of a handsome, selfless, asexual man named tony and his pansexual friend Bruce who has a great ass. Happy now?<br/>"I swear you’re hopeless. I'm taking over the summary. Sorry about him, anyway this is the story of Tony, Bruce and how they survived living in SHEILD, Las Vegas. The least hetro-normative place on earth."<br/>Hey! Natasha down the hall is straight, I think. And anyway who says 'hetro-normative'? I like my summary better...<br/>------------------------------------------------------------<br/>other wise known as: i read that textpost on tumblr and instagram (you know the one) and i thought 'this is a good idea, i should do the thing. so heres the thing!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. when the lost met the hiding

**Author's Note:**

> criticism is very much appreciated. (And also a bit needed because i have no clue what im doing)

"Wow seriously? No that's cool I get it. I'm standing here at this busted up bus stop and you decided to be an asshole. Not cool dude, not cool."  
Let it be put on the record that rain sucks. Actually no not just rain, weather in general sucks. When someone decides to go out for their twenty fifth birthday, there's a blizzard warning. When someone gets dumped and kicked to the curb just because they won’t take over the family business, it’s bright, sunny, and kids are playing in the snow while an almost million heir wallows in the irony. And then to top it all, as soon as he decide to move on with his life and get a new place, it starts to rain and he loses one of his bags at the check in! Well that last part wasn't really the weathers fault but as the now thoroughly bummed out genius stepped onto the bus he decided to blame it on the weather anyway.   
As he slumped into a seat in the back of the bus he tucked his bags underneath the seat and pulled out the envelope containing his new life. Letting his fingers brush against the soft seats as he read over the information inside one more time.

‘Dear Anthony, (or should I call you Tony. Is it alright if I call you Tony?)  
Thank you for contacting me about the roommate offer. As you can probably tell from the photos my apartment is way too big for just me and thus all of the five people I know have talked me into trying to find a roommate to ‘share the price tag’ with. So thanks for this, I looked up the bus schedule by where you said your town was and it says there’s a bus coming straight here from the airport on Monday. You said you wanted to be out of town as soon as possible so I decided to send a ticket. I also put an extra key to the apartment in here along with a map of the town. If I’m not home when you get here feel free to come inside and start sorting stuff out.  
See you soon. – Dr. Bruce Banner.’

Well he wasn’t wrong about the bus apparently, but it was a long ride. As Tony dented his hair with a pair of headphones, the man sitting in the back of the dimly lit bus found herself wondering about the his roommate to be. It was quite the daring thing for him to do wasn’t it?  
‘Maybe he’ll look like Sherlock Holmes and I’ll become the next John Watson. He didn’t seem that freaked out about rooming with a stark either. And what kind of a place is called SHEILD anyway? I should call up Jarvis and ask him or something…’ well it was too late to back out now. Besides, Tony’s mother had always said not to get into a car with strange men, but he had said nothing about moving in with one.

It was quickly becoming apparent to tony that SHEILD, Las Vegas was not as horrible as it sounded. As he sat in the small looking café that had seemed like a quiet place to think. That outward appearance had lied to him though since the place was buzzing with life. life and an excessive amount of flirting if the conversations around him were anything to go by. Well at least a waiter was finally walking over.  
“Hello and welcome to the closet café. My names Bruce and what can I get for you?”  
“Uhm id like a… wait, Bruce? As in Bruce Banner?”  
The waiter in front of him stiffened and pointed the pen at tony in a way that was supposed to be threatening. Emphasis on supposed to.  
“Oh no. now listen here I told Barton that I wouldn’t be working at the corkscrew on Thursday and if he sent you over here to drag me into drag it’s not going to happen!”  
tony almost wanted to go along with whatever he was talking about just to know what he meant by ‘dragged into drag’ but the poor guy looked flustered enough already.  
“Nope. While that sounds like fun I’m definitely not here to drag you anywhere but a car so I can get to our apartment. Tony stark, from the emails?”   
After a few minutes of explaining, (explaining to Bruce’s boss, explaining to tony what they were explaining to Bruce’s boss, basically lots of serious stuff.) the two new roommates were sitting in Bruce’s bright green punch buggy car with the wind flowing through their hair as he explained all about the neighbors and the town as a whole. But considering that tony had been considered a pretty social person (playboy if you were being exact.), the short haired brunette sitting shotgun decided the information wasn’t needed as he took the time to examine his new friend a bit closer. Out of the long list he had made of potential roommate types Bruce seemed to fit into very few categories. If the brunette was to judge by looks alone, which he would have to for now, then he’d say that the combination of Bruce’s unruly mop of hair and the way he used his free hand to emphasize every word he said as a pair of comically big glasses slipped down his nose made him appear to be a loud, huggable person. But the way he slouched over the wheel and looked at the streets with dark, tired, greenish-brown eyes, mixed together with the fact that the skinny as a stick driver seemed to be unknowingly leaning away from him made Bruce out to be a much less sociable person. So basically tony had no clue what would happen next. Which was awesome since that was exactly what he needed right now. As they turned into the garage of one of the many bright feeling buildings Brucie bear looked at him with a warm, small smile and yep. He didn’t care if it was as a friend or as a cuddle buddy but he was definitely keeping this one.

 

“There’s a ramp. We can take to the elevator if you want.”  
“No thanks, I got this. Now if I could just…”  
“Holy shit tony!”  
Bruce had made the decision that his new roommate was insane. This decision had been made the moment that they stepped out of the car the bright eyed man had pulled out a suitcase that had to be at least an inch away from being taller than its owner was, and tried to pull it up the stairs.  
“You ok dude?”  
And now they were both buried underneath the suitcases contents. Great.  
Bruce looked up at the blurry outstretched hand before him as he searched for his glasses, if he was going to be assaulted by clothes he wasn’t going down alone. And with that thought he reached towards tony, and pulled.  
The red and yellow wearing man just laughed as he fell, making sure to land on his new buddy and hug him to death as revenge. Which wasn’t very hard considering the fact that they were also being squished to death by his giant red suitcase.  
“Tony please get up, I think there’s a rock in my spine.”  
Bruce gave the most intimidating stare he could muster, and then realized he was trapped under god knows how many clothes and being hugged by a complete stranger if he didn’t count the numerous emails they had exchanged.  
So there they lay, tony stark and Bruce Banner, officially roommates, and considered unofficially crazy by the overworked security guard who turned on the cameras to see two grown adults lying in a pile of clothes laughing their asses off in his lobby.


	2. when the jobless went back in time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> comments are appreciated, kudo if you want and all that jazz. Now then ON WITH THE STORY

The apartment, as it turns out, is not really an apartment at all. Over the course of a week a certain set of bright brown eyes had looked over every surface, googled the value of a flat in SHEILD, Las Vegas, and interrogated Bruce to the best of his ability. But his answers had been lack luster to say the least. His questions had gone from reasonably suspicious talk over the breakfast bar-“how did you afford to rent out the whole floor in the first place?”  
“I work at the local raves and bars as a bouncer sometimes.”- To Tony trying to beat Bruce at his own game because no way was that a real answer. - “oh my god, Brucie are you a pimp? That explains so much, like that one time when you went out at 11:00 pm and didn’t comeback until two. What the hell dude? Who are you even pimping?”   
“I’m not pimping anyone but if it makes you feel better I did set up two of my friends once. Besides how do you even know what pimping is?”   
“I’m asexual not blind.”- But to no avail. It wasn’t like his roommate wasn’t a social person. Ok that was a lie Bruce, whatever his middle name is, Banner had no concept of social skills and it would have been a tad worrying if tony wasn’t confident that he could balance it out with his amazing personality and wonderful influence (which still hadn’t taken effect yet but whatever.) now he sat on one of the living rooms many beanbag seats and watched the seemingly always tired man cook pancakes. Even though he hadn’t gotten all of the answers the genius had gotten to know him a bit better so it wasn’t a total loss, and he didn’t have time to waste today on that anyway.   
“Hey what am I supposed to wear for a job interview anyway?” Bruce’s eyebrows furrowed in thought as he placed the plates at the table.  
“Well I know that usually you wear a suit or a dress or whatever but I don’t think Rogers going to care that much, if you haven’t already noticed the neighborhoods pretty close so just wear what fits with music I guess.” Now that was something he had noticed. When Tony had gone down to the hair salon during his job hunt he had been shocked by the amount of color combinations he saw. The owner of the place seemed like they might have been a girl but when tony asked they turned away from cutting someone’s hair and just said ‘Yes’ without anyone giving them a second glance, and then immediately asked how Tony did his hair. After a quick explanation of ‘I don’t use anything besides shampoo and conditioner’ the entire salon had gotten to work on fixing his apparently horrendous hair (he was a bit offended) while they talked to him about their jobs like they were having circle time in preschool. From there his job adventures had led to the discovery that this town was the polar opposite of his old place of residence. Instead of stuffy rooms and business suits the air here was ‘do ask do tell’ and no one cared how odd your answer was. Tony rolled off of the bean bag and took his seat at the table before devouring the pancakes faster than possible as Bruce read some poorly hidden fanfiction underneath the table. He looked up towards Tony suddenly as he took a fork full of pancake.   
“What’s your favorite musical era?” Tony put down his glass of milk and gave him a questioning gaze. “I’ve never really thought about it but I guess I listen mostly to hard rock stuff. Why the sudden interrogation?” he said while stuffing another piece of pancake into his mouth.  
“I’m quizzing you for the interview. If he asks you anything at all it’s going to be that since he’s mildly addicted to swing music and basically anything to do with the forties and fifties.” Walking to the kitchen he placed the dirty dishes in the sink, rolled up the sleeves on his sweater and looked only slightly annoyed when Tony put his plates in the sink after he started washing.   
“I’m going to go put on a new shirt and then head out, wish me luck!” The ever helpful Brucie bear just gave him a nod and a small smile as he slid down the hall with his socks.

‘Walking down the street is quieter than I thought it would be too.’ The brown eyed man thought to himself as he looked back down at the piece of paper with the address to Rogers’s records that Bruce had given him after five failed attempts to get a job. It wasn’t that far so for now he just focused on the sound of people walking. The streets weren’t bustling with people, in fact so far he had counted thirty people, two dogs, and three cats. (Who walks their cat anyway? Weird.). The music in his headphones had died down to the smooth tones of Cab Calloway and Frank Sinatra a while ago and he was starting to see why his roommate’s friend liked it so much. Walking into the shop he paused the song and wrapped his headphones while he looked around. It looked vintage, not in the sense that everything was polaroid’s and sepia filters but in the sense that if your grandfather gave you a photo of him drinking a soda pop next to the jukebox in the corner it would look as if nothing had changed. Walking up to the counter Tony subtly coughed to get the attention of the black haired man sitting behind it.   
“Hello there коротышка how can I help you?”  
“I was told I could get a job here. My buddy Bruce sent me and-“  
“You mean the science nerd? Steve told me he would be sending someone over today. Just stay right there and I’ll get him for you.” He interrupted, hopping off of the bar stool chair and reaching for his left arm.   
“Do you need any help with that or…” Tony asked as he watched the man strap on his prosthetic. Walking towards the dark blue door in the back he called out over his shoulder- “its fine коротышка I’ve got it.” –and then he was gone. Whistling in front of the counter the lone customer decided to look around. If he was going to be here every day then it might help to memorize all of the small nooks and crannies of the place. And the black haired guy who he assumed would be his coworker wasn’t too bad looking either. (Even if Tony was pretty sure the dude insulted him.) Going through all the crates of records and shelf's of tapes it was quite obvious that the record shop was either vastly under stocked or a lot of people owned record players and Walkman’s. God he hoped he hadn’t just signed up for a job at the hipster hangout. Going to the back of the store he noticed a small sign next to a cardboard box.  
‘If you happen to have any old music or music gear you don’t need please consider donating it to the shop for store credit.’  
Well then, the geek in the corner had at least five copies of ‘the dark side of the moon’ back in his room that were going to go towards a good cause in the next few days. ‘I could probably buy a record player with all the unused headphones I have.’ he thought slowly making his way back to the counter of the technologically disabled store where he saw the guy with one arm had come back and was conversing with a tall blonde man in a tee shirt that was illegally tight and oh my god was that an ass if he ever saw one.   
“You must be stark right? Bruce told me a lot about you.” the six pack said to him with a smile.   
“Yep that’s me and you are?” walking back to the door he beckoned Tony to follow before answering the question.   
“My names Captain Steve Rogers, but you can just call me Steve. By the way nice shirt” He said as they walked down the hall. “Well it’s very nice to meet you Captain. I hope Brucie hasn’t already scared you out of giving me a job.” he smirked, plopping down into a chair as they walked into what looked to be his office. Sitting behind his desk Steve looked towards him with a nervous smile that seemed to be aimed just behind Tony. Before he could figure out why Steve appeared to be trying to hide a laugh a small fluff ball jumped up into his lap.  
“Aw hi there little dude, didn’t think I’d meet you here. Bruce mentioned you owned a dog but I thought it would be, well… bigger.” he said as the adorable black pug made itself comfy on his lap, content to lay there and be pet.  
“Yeah most people get that impression but I couldn’t resist adopting Winter. Bruce and I were volunteering down by the shelter one day and he had this sad look in his eyes when they told us Winter was going to be put down soon if he didn’t get a home. He was too cute to refuse so I got one for when he comes by.” The mental image of his soft spoken roommate being surrounded by puppies was too cute. Also did Stevie boy call Winter cute or Bruce? Hmm... He’d have to file that thought away for now. “That’s adorable. So how are we supposed to do the whole interview crap anyway?”   
“You know what, I think I know all I need to know. From what Bruce and Bucky have told me I think you’ll fit in fine.”  
‘So that’s the counter man’s name.’ He looked up in surprise at the man behind the desk.   
“Seriously? No questions about past jobs or anything? What if I’m secretly part of the Russian mafia or something?” Steve avoided his questioning gaze for a few moments and then gave him a look he couldn’t really read.   
“As long as you make it here by nine and don’t leave till five Monday through Friday I don’t think that will be an issue.” And that was that. After a week or so of job hunting Tony almost-a-millionaire Stark had gotten a job in twenty minutes. Before he could say anything else the smooth sound of a saxophone suddenly pierced the air. Looking down to make sure his phone hadn’t accidentally turned on he looked back up to see Steve picking up his phone.  
“Sorry about this. I’ll be right back.” He walked out of the room with an apologetic look towards tony, who looked down at the puppy toying with the end of his tee shirt. Going back to scratching behind the adorable pup’s ear he plugged back into the music and admired the wall of faded and coffee stained photos mixed in with shiny new ones on the wall behind his new boss’s desk, awaiting his return as he walked over to get a closer look with Winter in his arms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> in case you were wondering what our wonderful Bucky called Tony.
> 
> коротышка - shorty 
> 
> also sorry if Steve seems a little ooc. i just thought that if Steve had never met Howard that tony might not seem like such an ass to him.


	3. when the toddler found the lab

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry that this chapters so short, but to make up for it guess who's now here and in it for the long haul?!

Being tackled off his bed in three in the morning was really not a situation Bruce ever thought he would get himself into. But he was discovering that common sense and politeness were unknown to most people he became friends with, besides when they want something, or in Tony’s case he got high off his ideas. Speaking of Tony…  
“Mind explaining why you felt the need to jump me when most people would be sleeping?”  
“Why didn’t you tell me you had a lab?!” He shouted from his place underneath his grumpy roommate’s duvet. Bruce leaned over from his place still half on his bed to help the overgrown toddler out as he thought of a response. He had almost forgotten the lab was there at all if he was to be honest. The last time he had done anything even remotely scientific had been at least a year ago and it didn’t end well.  
“I didn’t think you’d be that interested in my nerdy escapades.” He said as they stood in the pitch black room. Tony pulled Bruce up and out of the room with an insulted look on his face.  
“Seriously has no one heard of me before? I got to be honest I didn’t think Stark was a common last name but now I’m starting to wonder...” He paused in front of a metallic purple door that had always been locked and un-talked about by the two. Well that was up until Tony got bored of trying to find ways to get his boss to listen to AC/DC and pulled out the lock picks. Dragging Bruce inside with him the genius flipped on the lights while looking around the small room and grabbed a manila folder with the word J.A.R.V.I.S scribbled on in blue marker. “Now then as payment for keeping your amazing science skills from me and not telling me how you can afford all this stuff were going to build this amazing butler.” Bruce took the folder from Tony and flipped through it under the florescent lights, wondering how his life came to the point where he was actually considering working on the most ingenious AI the scientist had ever seen while the genius behind it looked at Bruce as if he was waiting for a switch to be flipped.   
“How long have you been working on this?”  
“Five, maybe six, years. It all got kind of hazy after the first couple schematics.” Tony answered, leaning back onto the table. A quick stare down later and Bruce nodded decidedly.  
“I’ll do it.” Tony cheered and held his hand in the air.  
“But I’m a bit worried about how much sleep you’ve gotten.” The scientist voiced as he completed the high five and shuffled out of the room, heading towards the kitchen, if they were going to do this they may as well do it right.   
“How do you take your coffee?”

Was it late or early? Either way he hadn’t felt the rush of a project that big in a while now, he almost forgot how it felt to get lost in the feeling of accomplishment. Sliding down onto the floor from his place in the corner Bruce looked towards the incredibly blurry clock. He gave up trying to read the numbers and instead looked towards the labs newest occupant.   
"Jarvis, what time is it?"  
"It is currently eight thirty three Doctor Banner." Mumbling a thank you the scientist rolled across the floor until he was sprawled over Tony's back. They had started on Jarvis around five am so that meant it only took them five snack breaks, ten water bottles, and fifteen hours and thirty minutes to complete. Nudging Tony in the ribs to get his attention Bruce spoke. "Jarvis says its eight thirty."  
Reaching into a nearby bowl Tony grabbed some blueberries and munched in them as he moved Bruce from his back to his stomach so they could both look towards the currently buzzing computer screen.  
"I know that our IQs combined could probably beat everyone else combined but that can't be right." After a few seconds of realization Bruce hesitantly asked the question on both their minds. "Jarvis?"  
"Yes doctor banner?"  
"What day is it?"   
"Saturday sir."  
Both men groaned at the answer and started searching for their phones.  
"Well shit, I missed my first two days of work and you missed you super spy missions or whatever it is you do." While the two burnt out friends made their way to the living room Tony checked his phone to find a fuck ton of messages and missed calls from Rogers. Looking over to where Brucie bear sat on the couch he guessed from his horrified expression that his phone had about the same thing.  
"Sirs it appears that Mr. Rogers is currently being dragged to your residence by an un-filed companion.”  
"Thanks Jarvis. Bruce, were screwed aren't we? Bruce?!" Well shit Bruce was out for the count. Pushing his overworked science buddy so he was lying on the coach instead of falling off of it Tony considered his options.  
"SON OF BANNER I SHALL SAVE YOU!" And suddenly all the escape routes didn't need to be accounted for because some dude just broke down the freaking door and Rogers is lecturing a beach Blondie about something and, oh god, he's been up to long without caffeine for this. Suddenly Rogers was in front of tony pulling a blanket on him (when did he lie down?) And asking him what in the world they were doing for four days. Tony just pressed his face into the blanket and clearly mumbled before passing out while Steve told him that 'science is not a good enough explanation.'


End file.
